The Dallas daily herald. [volume] (Dallas, Tex.) 1873-1887, 1887-06-06
A PATENT PICKEREL TRAP.
IL Was Death on the Fish, but Not OF
Much Use, ms II Caught Nothing but
Their Heads.

A score of yawning pickerel heads,
dried and vanished. decorate the back
bar of the American house, writes n
Bloomfield, N. j., correspondent of The
New YORK. Sun. They are evidently put
there for the single purpose Of making
people ask questions, as they are Meth
er pretty nor ornamental. Barkeeper
Eddy will not explain the presence of
the heads, and his manner when ar
preached on the subject indicates that
the gaping jaws and long faces of the
fish are suggestive of something either
unpleasant or disappointing. The
landlord. hover, is never too busy
to tell about these trophies, and gener-
ally when he begins. to tell the story
the barkeeper goes into the billiard
room and makes noise with the stove
CRATE, or busies himself cleaning cues
and busting the tables.
"Were all those pickcrel caught OF
onceP" asked guest one day last week
in the absence of the barkeeper.
IAN at once" answered the land
lord
"Rather nice mess. That biggest
head looks rs though it would about fit
a six-pound fish. Must have been
some fun pulling him in" remarked
the guest.
well, hardly" said the landlord,
holding up the head and looking
through it at the questionor. 1T was
very funny, but the fellow that caught
it didn't have any fun. We had all the
fun after he got home. 1 guess you
haven't heard about Eddy's patent
back-action automatic piclierel tip-ups,
have youP"
The guest assured the landland that
he had not, and showed SO much inter-
est in the matter that the latter leaned
with his elbow on the bar and began;
"Wcll, you see, Eddy is always trying
to make folks believe he is great fish
erman, and this winter he laid himself |
out for a days fishing through the ice.
He talked about il for months, and re-
fused to take anybody into the snap
with him, although lots of the boys
wanted to go. He spent all his leisure
time for a week drawing plans OF some
thing, and then for month more he
was either running over to the black
smiths or puttering around in the car
riage house every time he got a mo-
ment to spare. One day Invent into the
blacksmith shop and saw thingumbob
with q coiled steel wire spring to it.
and the blacksmith told me it was
patent pickerel trap, and that he was
going to make two dozen like it. He
didn't tell me who ordered him to- but
I didn't need telling. l knew they
were for Eddy.
"Well, one day last month Eddy said
he wanted to 60 up to Hopatcong next
day. and l said all right. Next morn
ing he started with two champagne
baskets and we guyed him about them
and told him they wouldn't hold all
The fish he was going to catch. He
laughed and said: Hold on till l
come back and | will show you. He
came back about 10 o clock that night
and chucked twenty pickercl heads on
the table there. l asked him where
the rest of the fish where, and he told
me that he got hungry and ate them,
m that's all he would say about the
matter. don't suppose would have
ever found out about it, but for Ike
of Newark. He was work
ing at the big Hotel Breslin. and when
Eddy got up there at the lake Ike went
out to help him cut holes in the ice and
set his new-fanglcd tip-ups 1t was a
mighty cold day, and just as soon
as they got the things fixed they shot
for the hotel and staid there for a
couple OF hours. Now, Ike described
those tip ups to me. and / didn't need
else but his description to ex-
plain how Eddy got those heads He
said that when the trays were stuck
down into the ice long arm Of steel
wire stood straight up in the air. At
the lower end the wire was coiled
into spring. like one Of those traps
used for throwing glass balls and clay
birds at shooting match. Apiece of
fish-line was fasten ed to the end Of the
wire, and then it was was sprung down